Sony's Phil Harrison talks PS3 homebrew possibilities
By Donald Melanson 
posted Apr 23rd 2007 11:55AM
posted Apr 23rd 2007 11:55AM
Given some of the bold statements that Sony's Phil Harrison has made, hinting at possible PlayStation 3 homebrew plans doesn't seem all that remarkable, but it's still nice to hear it coming from the source. While he unfortunately didn't get very specific, he certainly seemed to be open to the idea in a recent interview with Slashdot, saying that he fully supports "the notion of game development at home using powerful tools available to anyone," adding that he believes it's "a vital, crucial aspect of the future growth of our industry." He then went on to earn himself a bit of cred by talking about his Commodore 64 coding past, also citing Sony's Net Yaroze homebrew development kit for the PS1 as evidence of the company's openness to the idea. Let's just hope that any homebrew effort on the PS3 doesn't demand the same premium price that the Net Yaroze did.[Via Gamesindustry.biz]
lol... Sony supporting homebrew... Isn't that an oxymoron?
(Oh, for those who need a little more proof, think: PSP)
Ha!
>(Oh, for those who need a little more proof, think: PSP)
Sony has been pretty secretly supporting homebrew on PSP for years. of course you can't make that public and then get sued by software developers.
User generated content is what Sony hopes to push HOME to another level, and by doing so, hopefully PS3 as well.
Microsoft is the one restricting homebrew or even open apps.
To kingofwale:
While I would love to believe that Sony is indeed supporting homebrew, and while the argument that even after this long, the fact that there are still exploits in Sony's latest firmwares allowing homebrew execution indicates that Sony doesn't want to shut it out is indeed (a little) plausible, I'm going to stick with my stand that Sony has no affection for homebrew, unless I get proof of otherwise.
So, you state that they secretly support homebrew. Care to provide something to back that up?
It would be very cool if Sony allowed home brewed software to be ran on the PS3 but I don't see this ever happening.
However, maybe Sony will try something like Microsoft's XNA development tools. The Xbox 360 and PC are already able to run games created with XNA, not to mention also being able to download/purchased them on Xbox Live Marketplace.
They need to open the RSX more to the Other OS feature. Then programmers could play with the PS3 in a linux environment.
Do you remember the first 'homebrew' videogames that one could make using the Intelliputer for Mattel's Intellivision? Didn't work much then...
Given the amount of ANY games for the PS3, Sony could use homebrew games much less games of any kind.
homebrew = mini games
eh, am I the only one sick of "mini games"?
Yeah man, XBMC is like the worst mini-game ever! I cant even figure out what the goal is!
>So, you state that they secretly support homebrew. Care to provide something to back that up?
of course. the fact they allow Linux to install in PS3, encouraging user generated apps and content (especially in @HOME) the fact they still haven't completely cracked down on PSP homebrew.
Remember what Microsoft did when the first news of potential homebrew and how quickly they stopped it via a secret firmware update.
Sony is the grandfather of DRM, if they really want to go hardcore on Anti-homebrew, you really think they couldn't have done it already?
"Remember what Microsoft did when the first news of potential homebrew and how quickly they stopped it via a secret firmware update."
Because it wasn't about homebrew then, it was about piracy. It didnt do squat regardless.
I love my XBMC modded Xbox as much as the next guy, but your kidding yourself if you dont think the overwhleming majority of modded xboxes are used for playing pirated discs.
Sony should be more worried about quality games, and getting the price point down on the Albatross3 then getting its customers to generate content for them.
Kingofwale: "Sony is the grandfather of DRM, if they really want to go hardcore on Anti-homebrew, you really think they couldn't have done it already?"
Yes, I think they couldn't -- just because they've been doing DRM for a long time doesn't make the core model of DRM any less broken. Cracking a "secure" system isn't a matter of IF, it's a matter of WHEN. Sony has patched and re-patched their PSP firmware trying to cripple homebrew, and to some extent they've succeeded -- there's still no way to run homebrew on a PSP patched to a firmware after (IIRC) 3.03, or maybe it's 3.00, short of installing a modchip to flash your firmware back to an earlier version.
As for Linux on the PS3: did you know that they let homebrew coders use the processor, but not any of the accelerated functions of the GPU? It's like coding for a laptop with one of those shared-memory Intel onboard graphics cards -- if you plan on doing anything pretty in 3D, forget about it. It's like XNA, only worse -- XNA restricts network communication while PS3 restricts use of high-end graphics. At least with XNA, you could make a game like Geometry Wars. On the PS3, you'd be stuck with really low-end 3D (rendered entirely on the CPU), or 2D side-scrollers, or RPGs that look like they came from the SNES. Who has better homebrew support?
Well if you can use use the processor entirely(using all the fpu for example) I think you wouldn really need the gpu...
How bout you read that article a little closer...
FROM TFA:
"So, if we can make certain aspects of PS3 open to the independent game development community, we will do our industry a service by providing opportunities for the next generation of creative and technical talent. Now having said all that, we still have to protect the investment and intellectual property rights of the industry so we will always seek the best ways to secure and protect our devices from piracy and unauthorized hacking that damages the business."
So, they encourage it, but they'll always support "industry" before they let you use the PS3 for homebrew.
Wow. Even when someone from Sony comes our to say that they support homebrew, they get flamed.
Really? The company is open to homebrew? Tell that to PSP owners...
KC:
I think it's one thing to flame the guy, but it's a completely different thing to express so much skepticism because of Sony's long, long history of fighting the 'fourth party' game development.
I think a lot of people have been to busy hating Sony to remember that this is the company that introduced the Net Yaroze, a relatively cheap development kit for consumers. And that SCEI is also officially supporting Linux, and has the ONLY video game console of the seventh generation that has support for end-user development (YDL). So Phil Harrison talking about homebrew possibilities isn't all that far-fetched.
Although if I were looking at this from SCEI's point of view, homebrew is bad, because it encourages people to download free minigames and massive profits will be lost because the games are how SCEI earns back the money put into developing and manufacturing the systems.
Most of you seem to be oblivious (and Phil Harrison too) to the fact that "Homebrew" is another way of saying "Playing my pirated ROMS and ISO's on your console" (Roms for everything pre-PS1, ISO's for after). There is no real (gaming) homebrew scene. Games that people made for the PSP for example, are horrible, and noone plays them. Neither Sony nor Microsoft (nor Nintendo for that matter) supports the true definition of "Homebrew" and they never will. Especially not Nintendo, now that they are reselling their old games as (basically) roms. I'm not a proponent of pirating old games and playing them on (say) a modded console such as the Xbox, but I still find it offensive when someone like Phil Harrison (The king of PR Bullshit) comes out and talks about how Sony supports homebrew (which is a blatant lie)
Why would anyone want homebrew? There are already enough iterations of tetris, blackjack, solitare, mahjongg, mines...
But seriously, if someone wrote a PS3 homebrewed editor for AVCHD files, I would be all over it.
How about making a media front-end for PS3, or a mediacenter like myth? Any homebrewers ready for that?
Don't Sony already have their own version of Homebrew??? I believe the industry calls them Rootkits!!!!